Neko champion
by silverbrumby123
Summary: AU. Ichigo is a young gymnast that wants to be the best. No pairings as of yet.


Well here's another new fic from me...

;p

In this fic, people have some animal features (like cat ears and tail for Ichigo), they keep them throughout their lives and gives them certain qualities etc. If there are any queries, then I will be happy to answer them for you.

Ichigo's hair colour will be her normal one (dark red) and she will have her original eyes as well (brown). Its the same for the other Mew mews.

anyway, this fic was going to be an ice skating fic, with gymnastics on the side, but it had a mind of it's own and went off into a different direction...

So now it's only a gymnastics fic, but I can still put ice skating in it if reviewers ask for it, however, it will be gymnastics dominated.

I'm not bothered about the pairings either, so you can vote on either IchigoxRyou, or IchigoxMasaya. The majority wins. There won't be any pairings for a while though...

I will also put a glossary of gymnastic/skating(if it happens) terms at the end of the fic when they are needed.

Disclaimer: I don't own Tokyo mew mew...

- - -

Chapter 1: Small beginnings.

Ichigo Momomiya was a sweet little girl with a bubbly personality.

She had dark red hair, and her eyes were a chocolate brown, that seemed to melt the coldest of hearts within minutes.

Her black cat ears and tail suited her perfectly and, like cats, she had an amazing balance.

Overall, Ichigo sported a very cute, irresistible look, and while she wasn't overly spoilt, her parents found it very hard to resist her anything.

Her mother and father were very loving parents. Her father, Shintaro Momomiya, was a business man, and worked in a large building in the hustle and bustle of Tokyo, a half hour drive from their suburban home. Her mother, Sakura Momomiya, was just a regular housewife, content to look after Ichigo while her husband brought in the money. She planned to go into teaching once Ichigo was in full-time school though.

To anyone that looked at them, the Momomiya family were the perfect family. There was, however, just one flaw.

Or at least Shintaro and Sakura Momomiya thought there was.

The problem was, that while they weren't fat, they were both terribly unfit, something that they hated more than anything, but were too lazy to change. Because of this, they were unwilling for their young daughter to go through the same thing, and had decided that it would be a great thing for their daughter to take up a sport, even though she was so young.

When Ichigo reached the age of three, they decided to find the perfect sport for their daughter, and sat down at the computer, looking through lists of activities around the local area...

- - -

"How about football?"

"She's not a boy! Football is too boyish... and messy."

"Errrr, tennis?"

"I don't know. I don't find the sport all that interesting myself. It's only hitting a ball to the person on the other side of the net after al."

"Golf?"

"Don't be ridiculous! How much exercise are you going to get from hitting a ball into a hole? I doubt they actually have golf lessons anyway. I think she should do ballet. A nice, girlie sport..."

"Oh God no! My sister did ballet. Please spare me the memories!"

"Your sister isn't that bad Shintaro dear."

"She is, you didn't have to live with her for 16 years."

"You're just exaggerating."

"Whatever... how about gymnastics? It's a girl dominated sport, and you get a lot of exercise from it, as well as flexibility. It's also quite nice to watch."

"Hmmm, I suppose so. Do we have any lessons in this area?"

"Errrr, they have lessons at the Miyaki leisure centre, but if we travel a bit further into Tokyo, there's a new gymnastics club that's just started up. It offers more frequent lessons than the leisure centre does, and has better facilities."

"OK then, is there a number?"

"Yeah, right here."

"OK, I'll be back in a sec," Sakura said, getting up and walking over to the phone.

Within the space of 5 minutes, Ichigo had been enrolled into the Neko gymnastics club, and was due to start next term, two weeks away.

- - -

_2 years later..._

A young woman looked irritably at the young children she was meant to be teaching. They were chatting amongst themselves, and one small girl was even picking her nose...

She sighed sadly, before trying to continue with her lesson.

The lady's name was Kureru Shikara, and she was the head gymnastics coach at the Neko gymnastics club. In fact, she was the only coach at the club.

She had started the club just two years ago and, like she had expected, had received a flood of children join in hopes that they would become gymnasts. She had plenty of coaches to help her, and plenty of different classes with waiting lists.

However, just one year later, a new gymnastics club started up a little further into Tokyo. The new club, named the Tokyo Olympic gymnastics club, had state of the art equipment, and, apparently, some of the best coaches in Japan.

Kureru hadn't minded. Her club was cheaper to attend, and her students enjoyed the classes.

But not enough, it seemed.

The day the club opened, only 5 of her 30 students arrived for the first class. It was only later that she discovered that over 150 of her 200 students had converted to the new club, withdrawn by their parents who wanted the best for their children. After completely going over all her files, she found she had just 40 students left, and all of her newly formed 'squad' gymnasts had gone, forcing her to pull out of the upcoming competition, that the new club eventually won (with her old gymnasts).

It had been an even further embarrassment to find that most of the kids that had stayed on only did so because they couldn't afford to take their new children to the new club, or weren't willing to travel the extra distance.

Eventually, all her other coaches had quit, tempted by the better pay of the new club, or unwilling to coach at such an empty club.

If her husband didn't earn so much money, she would have had to sell the building that she had built for the club, and ended the club, which would have put an end to her dream of training an Olympic gymnast. But, even though the club was earning next to nothing, she kept going, her dream still alive, though it was almost lost.

She knew she was lucky that she owned the club building, rather than hold it at a leisure centre, she wouldn't earn anything at all then.

Still, within the next year, she gained just 20 new students, and lost 45, leaving 15 students attending the club all together. She couldn't bring herself to start a new squad, worried that they would attend the new club then instead.

Which brings us to what she was doing now, attempting to teach the class of 15 by herself.

She was very relieved that she insisted parents didn't watch.

"I want you all to attempt your bridge," she told them, and watched despairingly as they began to ly (an: is that even the correct spelling?) down on the floor, and try to push themselves up into the position. About 5 of them managed to hold it for 5 seconds before collapsing and trying again.

One of her students, Ichigo Momomiya, was still standing. She was one of the first to join the club, and one of the few that had stayed on through everything. She seemed talented, Kureru thought. She hadn't been put on the squad before, because she had been too young, but Kureru did remember short-listing her.

She watched in amazement as the five year old started to bend backwards slowly, into the bridge position. A back bend, and she hadn't begun teaching the class that yet, so she must have learnt it from watching the old advanced class. Ichigo held the bridge position confidently for about a minute, before rising back to a standing position.

Kureru didn't know whether to cry, or hug Ichigo, or both. In the end she opted to do nothing. She didn't want to scare the only talent she had at the club.

As soon as the class had finished, Kureru made plans to restore the squad, and the first gymnast on it would be Ichigo Momomiya.

- - -

As Kureru now only held classes once a week on Tuesdays, Kureru had to wait a whole week until she was able to confront Ichigo's parents.

The lesson finally ended, and the children started to run out the doors, to their parents who waited in the car park.

Ichigo was always one of the last to leave, lingering around as if she wanted to say something, but never seeming to gather enough courage to say it.

But today was different. She took a deep breath and walked determinedly towards Kureru.

"Erm, Mrs Shikara? Could I ask you something?" she asked politely.

Kureru nodded for her to continue.

"I was just wondering, what do I have to do to be on the squad? 'Cause I really wanna compete in competitions, and you said that only the squad could do that..." she mumbled, trailing off.

Kureru smiled. What a coincidence. Ichigo continued, almost desperately, "I practice every day, honest!"

Kureru ruffled Ichigo's hair, and opened her mouth to speak,

"Lets see To get into the squad, you have to be able to do a perfect bridge, the splits, hold a handstand for 5 seconds, and be able to do straight forward rolls and cartwheels."

"I can do all of those things really good. Do... you think I can be in the squad? Please?" Ichigo said, giving Kureru big puppy eyes.

Kureru nodded.

"Lets go and have a talk with your parents, shall we?"

- - -

It seemed that Ichigo's parents were absolutely delighted with the news that Ichigo would be in the squad. It was more than likely that it had been them who had encouraged Ichigo to talk with Kureru.

Her mother, Sakura, has immediately said that she could get Ichigo down to the club at any day of the week, and while this wasn't exactly what Kureru had intended, it had been arranged that Ichigo would have lessons every week day, from 5-7pm, and she was free to practice whatever she wanted to in her old lesson, which ran Tuesdays, 5-6pm.

Her parents seemed eager for the new lessons to start immediately, and it was decided that the new routine would begin the next day.

Kureru found herself anticipating a gymnastics lesson for the first time in months.

- - -

That's chapter 1.

And yes, Kureru is a name...

Next chapter: Ichigo begins the new routine.

Please review!


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